Copyright Office Modernization

Developing the ECS The ECS will automate Office workflows and serve as the online public interface to the Copyright Office. Currently, the ECS’s three main development focus areas are recordation (ongoing), registration (anticipated start fall 2019), and system of public record (anticipated start fall 2019). The Office:

• Continued to gather and prioritize requirements for the new system of public record initiative that will eventually replace the current public catalog system.

• Began registration development planning activities. Systems development for the modernized registration system is expected to kick off before the end of 2019.

• Continued recordation development.

Comprehensive Access to Public Records The Copyright Office continues to work on improving access to public records, including by:

• Assessing historical public records, both those housed within legacy systems and those not easily accessible to the public online. The Office is in the process of converting the extensive, paper-based pre-1978 entries into digital format to make them accessible and searchable online.

• Digitizing more than 26,000 record books. These images are being scanned to extract metadata to enable a robust search. The Office continues to perform quality assurance for these images. This is a multi-year effort.

Data Management Initiative Data management continues to be an important focus of the Copyright Office’s modernization efforts. The Office:

• Completed both (1) the initial data management plan for Office data, and (2) the initial enterprise data model, which will govern how data is stored and connected within the ECS.

• Continued to examine a business intelligence (BI) and data analytics solution, which will yield better insight into how the copyright community utilizes Copyright Office systems.

• Continued developing a data migration plan to determine data flow from various sources to the ECS system.

Business Process Reengineering The Copyright Office’s business process reengineering (BPR) efforts are ongoing and include a number of different activities, including the following since the last Quick Facts:

• Continued partnership with the Office of Personnel Management on a workload analysis and an organizational analysis and redesign to ensure that the Office is optimally staffed and structured for postmodernization.

• Awarded a BPR contract to an external vendor in June. Project kickoff occurred in July.

Outreach It is important that the Copyright Office continues to keep the public informed about our progress. In addition to these Quick Fact sheets, the Office has engaged in the following outreach efforts:

• Continued a bimonthly webinar series to keep the public up to date on ECS progress and focus areas. The first webinar was held on January 31, 2019. The July webinar, the fourth in the series, answered modernization questions from previous webinars in order to explain the functions of the ECS, future available data, and more. The September webinar will discuss the Recordation Modernization Initiative (RMI), the reasons for modernizing, progress so far, and new features expected in the system.

• Began the ECS User Experience project in June. This is a contract engagement with three focus areas: Registration Examiner and Administrative User Experience Design, Recordation Usability Testing, and Copyright Modernization Design System Support.

• Collected the Title Upload Recordation Modernization Initiative survey results on July 10, 2019. Analysis continues for system development.

The Copyright Office is modernizing, which means that we are 1 building a new Enterprise Copyright System (ECS) featuring a user-centered and flexible design, 2 streamlining processes and policies, 3 improving access, and 4 reimagining the entire Office.

Quick Facts – September 2019

Please contact us at askcmo@copyright.gov for more information or to get involved.

There are several major efforts in modernization: